The present invention relates to firearms employing consumable, caseless ammunition.
Firearms utilizing caseless ammunition have been previously proposed as evidenced, for example, by U.S. Pat. No. 2,632,391 issued to Kintzinger on Mar. 24, 1953, and U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,020,741 and 4,123,963 issued to the present inventor on May 3, 1977 and Nov. 7, 1978, respectively. The disclosures of the latter two patents are incorporated herein by reference as if set forth at length. In U.S. Pat. No. 4,123,963 there is disclosed a firearm which employs a consumable, caseless propellant charge for propelling a projectile. The firearm includes a magazine for storing projectiles and propellant cartridges. A reciprocating bolt includes two laterally open pockets, a front one of which receives a projectile and a rear one of which receives a propellant cartridge during a forward stroke of the bolt. At the end of the forward stroke, a firing pin is pushed through the bolt to ignite a primer disposed within the propellant charge. The propellant charge deflagrates and ignition gas pressure is communicated to the rear of the projectile to propel the latter from the firearm.
Despite the advancement in the art represented by U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,020,741 and 4,123,963, room for improvement remains. For example, from a safety standpoint the presence of a primer within the propellant cartridge renders the cartridge more sensitive to ignition and thus difficult to manufacture and store. Moreover, a direct hit on the magazine of the firearm could produce primer actuated ignition of the cartridges.
It is, therefore, an object of the present invention to minimize or eliminate such problems.
It is another object to increase the operational safety of a firearm employing caseless ammunition as well as to render the ammunition safer to manufacture and store.
It is an additional object to enable a primer for a propellant charge to be enclosed within a protective casing right up to the moment of detonation.